The Mountain West Conference was conceived on May 26, 1998, when the presidents of eight institutions - Air Force, Brigham Young, Colorado State, New Mexico, San Diego State, UNLV, Utah and Wyoming - met in Denver and decided to form the MWC.

The cornerstone of the conference's formation was the maintenance of long standing athletic rivalries among its member institutions. Hence the Mountain West Conference was formed. Located in Colorado Springs, Colo., when the MWC's doors opened for business the new league had in place a seven-year contract with ESPN giving the broadcaster exclusive national television rights to MWC football and men's basketball; and three-year agreements to send the league's football champion to the Liberty Bowl and a second team to the Las Vegas Bowl.

Traditional rivalries, hmm. Well, with the Texicans gone from the WAC for the most part, the main reasons for the formation of the MWC are vanishing quickly. There is still Fresno and Hawaii in the WAC (omitted from the MWC, and holding the WAC together), along with NMSU-UNM, UU-USU, UNR-UNLV, BYU-UH, Fresno-SDSU, rivalries in-between conferences. The WAC and the MWC might have no better time to merge than right now.

WAC @ 2005:
Boise St.
Fresno St.
Hawaii
Idaho
Nevada-Reno
New Mexico St.
San Jose St.
Utah St.
La. Tech

OK, we have some schools that are discardable, namely:
TCU
La. Tech
San Jose State (NCAA I-A qualifications)

Some pairs may be good additions to the Pac-10, like Nevada schools or the Idaho schools. I like the Idaho schools leaving myself. I don't think the Pac-10 needs anymore Cali influence, with 4 schools already, so SDSU and Fresno stay.

I think the Big 12 can take an extra Colorado school, but I'd prefer the WAC/MWC have access to the "capitol" of the intermountain region -- Denver.

I'm personally for Idaho schools going to the Pac-10 (they'll need some work), so I'll get rid of them in the mix.

So what's the best grouping for the following 12 teams?
Air Force
BYU
Fresno St.
Hawaii
Nevada-Las Vegas
Nevada-Reno
New Mexico
New Mexico St.
San Diego State
Utah
Utah St.
Wyoming

Shall we divide it North-South or East-West? I'll go N-S.

North:
Fresno St.
BYU
Nevada-Reno
Utah
Utah St.
Wyoming

South:
Air Force
Hawaii
Nevada-Las Vegas
New Mexico
New Mexico St.
San Diego State

Sounds like a decent conference with good growth potential. Not too hard to set up. It could be done theoretically in a matter of years. This could either be accomplished by a buyout or a voluntary merger between the two.

Last edited by byufan227 on Mon Jul 05, 2004 9:59 pm, edited 1 time in total.

The WAC and the MWC might have no better time to merge than right now.

But they also have very little reason, from the MWC perspective. The reason only TCU was added was that financial analyses of the MWC expansion options suggested few other scenarios were worth pursuing. ESPN told the conference a championship game was worth roughly $1-2 million, and one article (IIRC) said adding Fresno, Hawaii, Boise and UTEP would yield a net decrease in per-school revenue of $.75 mil.

- My impression is that New Mexico and Utah do not hold their State U counterparts in high enough regard to want them in the same conference. I don't know that they'd willingly push them out, but I don't recall hearing them champions their inclusion, either.

- I'll have to suggest the Pac 10/ Idaho schools marriage is more fancy than reality. Even if they were good schools, there's not enough market pull to make this work. IMO, anyway. Which means more high profile candidates like your BYU, Utah, CSU and Hawaii would more likely be drafted than Boise St.

- If there is indeed enough muster behind NCAA standards to knock SJSU down, the same could be said for other schools across the country (and possibly Idaho), causing enough of a shake-up to make your removal of La. Tech and TCU possible. Might it also be enough to bring former WAC'er UTEP back into the fold?

- I'll have to suggest the Pac 10/ Idaho schools marriage is more fancy than reality. Even if they were good schools, there's not enough market pull to make this work. IMO, anyway. Which means more high profile candidates like your BYU, Utah, CSU and Hawaii would more likely be drafted than Boise St.

I was thinking Nevada schools or a Boise/UNLV combo going there. I was basically just trying to get that magic number of twelve, so I took Idaho out. We can always have another 14-to-15-team conference...

This was just an arbitrary setup, I had other scenarios in mind as well. The point is there are so many interconference connections, that it would be good from a traditional rivalriy standpoint to merge. Right now they seem to exist separately as two factions of the same conference.

And yes, UTEP should be in this group (being right on top of NMSU almost), but I thought it would be weird to snatch them right back from C-USA. They'll come back eventually I bet.

Why would having extra teams lose money? Don't forget that the WAC team can beef up the overall income of the conference, as well as giving it more appeal. Hawaii, Fresno, and Boise have done well recently. Plus they have bowl games to boot. Having all those traditional rivalries as conference games helps out as well. It seems to me that they are yin and yang separated into two.

-- SEC and WAC/MWC comparison --

Let's put this in SEC terms. Let's say there were two conferences, Dixie (don't know if that's a real conference in lower divs), and SEC.

OK, now this is basically what you have right now if you're the Mountain West or the WAC. Sure, there are better teams in the SEC (not the real one), than the Dixie conference, as well as some good rivalries in the SEC. But, wouldn't it be better for the fans, the schools, the states, the TV companies, etc. if you only had one big conference to deal with in the region?

A few won't make the cut on the new consolidated conference, but there are still too many split rivalries just to ignore. I'm sure the teams in those conferences would like to save their OOC games for trying their team against a good team in another region, instead of using it against a cross-state rival.

I think part of the reason for the fledging western conferences is that they won't unify into one. This would really spark some interest into the overall regional fanbase. Can anyone argue that unification in the SEC region is a good thing? Obviously, part of the success of the SEC is the consolidated region it plays in. It can be similar for the western schools if they group up.

Look at the "markets" of the SEC. Big ones are B-han, New Orleans, Atlanta, and Nashville, and Memphis. There are plenty of comparable markets in the western region covered by the MWC/WAC. The people are (and by growth rates, will be) there, it's just a matter of getting their interest in a stable traditional product.

Before you go off on how much more interest there is in the South than the West in football, I must tell I live in the heart of it all. But I'll also tell you that there would be no support of the SEC if none of the teams ever did anything and the conferences were set up like swiss cheese in the South. If you think football is the only thing to do here, you need to visit sometime. The SEC support is big because there is something to root for in a unified setup, and provided a good impetus for growth. Not because, a bunch of local yokels were bored with their cotton planting and decided to check out the local school's football teams.

-- Growth potential --

We need to look at a conference more like a garden than a farmer's market. The plant growth largely depends on the layout of the fields, Obviously you're not going to be very successful if you have a hodge podge grouping of teams. Over the long haul, it's the teams' chemistry that will make the conference successful, not just a bunch of superstud teams that don't fit together.

Teams don't play solo exhibitions, they play against other teams. Having interesting matchups is a key to conference success. More people will rally up to watch and support conference matchups than individual team's exhibitions. Recruits, money, rankings, per-capita fan support, etc, etc are byproducts of a conference's chemistry not vice versa.

You have to give it time to grow.

-- Recruiting --

Recruiting is a byproduct of the success and popularity of schools in the region, not necessarily the cause. Look at New York. It's comparable in state population to Florida and Texas (although not in climate). Is the college game as popular there? No. What if it was? I'd bet you could label it as a recruiting super hotbed then. Being a football prospect these days requires a dedication to the game for a good period of time. Obviously a region with alot of successful teams is going to find more youth motivated to develop into star football prospects, than, say, Alaska.

This is one reason why a disproportionate amount NFL and I-A players come from the south than other areas of the country. What I'm saying, is "If you build it" (the conference) ", they " (recuits) " will come "

Last edited by byufan227 on Tue Jul 06, 2004 7:36 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Why would having extra teams lose money? Don't forget that the WAC team can beef up the overall income of the conference, as well as giving it more appeal. Hawaii, Fresno, and Boise have done well recently. Plus they have bowl games to boot. Having all those traditional rivalries as conference games helps out as well. It seems to me that they are yin and yang separated into two.

From what I recall of the MWC expansion discussions on this and other boards, ESPN wasn't prepared to pay enough to warrant an expansion to 12. Yes the overall contract would increase, but obviously not to a number the MWC wanted or felt would justify the inclusion of all the WAC powers. The MWC schools were better off, in their eyes, only splitting the pot 9 ways rather than 12.

I'm with you on this concept, though, and I feel reality can be molded by perception. I once said the biggest mistake the MWC did with their expansion was not billing itself as the best conference outside BCS. The MWC may in fact be the best outside the BCS as it is right now, but if they had gone right to 12 and assumed all the big guns from the WAC they would have positioned themselves for more national attention and the chance to clearly seperate themselves from the pack. Perceptions and conditions could change over time and their championship game could garner the ratings to warrant higher contracts in the future. Alas, they moved softly and quietly, IMO, and thus this discussion can still take place.

I still see Fresno St. moving over someday soon. And while I understand why just TCU was the best small move they could make, I wonder how they'll deal with it in the future should the conference indeed grow again. You're right in that stability counts; It helps programs build fan support and revenue, attract recruits and media attention. The MWC would've been better off had they indeed sunk the WAC and loudly assumed the role of the second most powerful conference in the west. It will be interesting to see how they react to every big win by WAC teams.

It is difficult to come up with the perfect "12" in the west, particularly with the PAC10. Adding two the PAC 10 would be choices from Nevada-UNLV, Utah-BYU or Hawaii and somebody. Each has viewed negatives.

I think MWC and WAC should merge too.
Big Sky should join Division 1 and take Idaho and San Jose St.

Yes, but Big Sky is I-AA's only true western football conference.

I guess they could promote the Div II teams to fill their place, but it's kind of slim in the West. Southern Utah and Cal-Poly are the only I-AA western teams not in the Big Sky, and they're indies. But they can always bring back the football programs of those Cali schools,
like LBSU.

EDIT:
add San Diego to that list of non-Big Sky schools in the West

Last edited by byufan227 on Thu Jul 08, 2004 7:51 pm, edited 1 time in total.

I have quickly become a fan of the Mountain West and have lost total faith, interest and respect for the WAC.

I think it would be a big injustice to what the Mountain West has achieved since splitting from the WAC to simply merge back with them.

To me it just seems the Mountain West is offering exciting teams that are competing on a higher level than the WAC could hope to achieve.

I think the realignment hooplah will breath some life back into the WAC, but I will reserve my judgement until 2006.

Now do I think the Mountain West could benefit from a 12 team conference? Only if it does not effect the quality they have developed. Nevada, Utah State and New Mexico State should provide instant rivalries dispite the whining of their counterparts. But outside of those, I don't see much of the WAC belonging in Mountain West.

Expansion would be on the terms of the Mountain West, and perhaps you could say that if they do take three teams from the WAC it could be considered a merger. But with it being on the terms of the Mountain West, it really isn't. It is more of a hostile take over.

Last edited by bobcatdude on Mon Aug 02, 2004 2:59 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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